AJ Dybantsa just went No. 1 overall to the Washington Wizards. That part is official now. But the 19-year-old forward didn’t always see this coming. For a long time, basketball was just something he did.
It took a pandemic and a growth spurt to flip the switch.
Speaking with ClutchPoints before the draft, Dybantsa was candid about when the game stopped being a hobby and started being a mission. It wasn’t when he first picked up a ball at age five. It wasn’t even when he started playing organized ball.
“I was five when I got introduced to it, but had a real basketball, probably at like six years old,” Dybantsa said. “I was just playing like the mini hoop when I was five. But I wasn’t like really in love with the game. I didn’t really start loving the game probably till like COVID.”
The timing lines up with something else. Over a single summer, Dybantsa shot up five inches. Suddenly the kid who used to get pushed around was the one doing the pushing. He was playing varsity as an eighth grader.
The commute that changed everything
There’s a reason Ace Dybantsa logged so many miles. He drove his son an hour and a half each way to Middleton, Massachusetts for workouts. That kind of commitment doesn’t happen unless someone believes.
“I kind of just clicked,” Dybantsa added. “I was playing against older guys, getting beat up, driving an hour and thirty to go work out. I was kind of bugging my dad to work out. When I came back, I grew like five inches in like three months and I’m starting to kill people out. I thought, ‘I could probably go somewhere far with this.’”
After a standout freshman season at BYU and an impressive prep career, the Wizards made him the face of their rebuild. He’ll join a roster that already features Trae Young and Anthony Davis, which should take some pressure off early.
Red Bull marked the occasion by putting up billboards of Dybantsa in Times Square. He didn’t see it coming.
What comes next
Summer League in Vegas is next. Dybantsa will likely match up against Darryn Peterson and the Jazz, plus Cameron Boozer and the Grizzlies. That’s where the real work starts.
“It’s exciting because I haven’t even tapped into my full potential yet,” Dybantsa told ClutchPoints. “I hope I’m still growing, still getting stronger, and I’m just not as polished yet. It’s going to be fun to see what happens. I don’t know in how many years, probably in like eight years, we’ll see what it’ll be like.”
Eight years is a long time in the NBA. But if his growth spurt taught him anything, it’s that things can change fast.
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